After founding the nonprofit Lux Art Institute in 1999 and arranging the purchase of five acres in Encinitas, it took another eight years of maneuvering through an administrative, governmental and political maze for Lux to get its first facility built.

But while the California Center for the Arts, Escondido, has closed its art gallery and the Oceanside Museum of Art has been challenged by staff turnover, the Lux Art Institute has become a North County landmark. In August, Lux will begin a $2.5 million renovation of a former school into the Lux Education Pavilion, it will announce this week.

“We’ve bursting at the seams,” Shaw said. “We’re turning away kids. And the events we do up here, we’ve had to tamp down because we can only fit so many people on the site.”

The year after it opened its first building in 2007 — it houses administrative offices, a studio and a live-in space for the artists-in-residence at the institute — Lux purchased a former day-care facility that is adjacent to its property and fronts El Camino Real. It leased the space to the Sanderling Waldorf School while developing a long-term plan for its entire, now-6-acre campus.

The Waldorf School is vacating the property, and Lux will start construction Aug. 13. It is expected to be completed by the end of the year.

“This will be a place where kids will be making things based on the stimulation they get from seeing professional artists do what they do,” said Shaw, who is responsible for Lux’s unique mission.

Rather than just passively presenting art, Lux invites children (and adults) to interact with an artist at work in the Lux studio. Since 2007, the institute has brought in five artists from around the country each year.

“We’re modeling creativity,” Shaw said. “It’s one of the most important skills you can have, certainly in this era. And when people ask, how do you teach that? My answer is: Lux is demonstrating how you teach that.”

In the past year, roughly 2,400 children took part in the programs Lux offers on its own campus (the educational activities are now based in several large trailers) and the institute reached an additional 8,300 students in 52 schools through in-class programs.

“We are blessed to have them literally in our own back yard,” said Nancy Dianna Jones, administrator of support services for the Encinitas Union School District. “Districts from all over the county come, and we are living in Lux territory, so to speak. It is a tremendous resource.”

As for the adults, in the past year approximately 12,000 visited Lux, which has an operating budget of roughly $1 million and a staff of 10.

To create the new Education Pavilion, the 25-year-old building’s roof, windows and doors will be replaced and the interior gutted to allow space for youth art studios, a teen room, a community learning space (essentially a lecture hall seating 90), an adult art lab, a small gallery and additional staff offices.

The remodel, designed by Anne Sneed, will also have outdoor gardens with a small amphitheater, picnic area and trails connecting the space with the other facility, the Artist Pavilion.

“We hope the exterior will be a wonderful community resource,” said Shaw, who envisions opening the space to community events, even weddings.

Shaw is confident fundraising for the Pavilion will soon be completed, and she’s planning on moving immediately into the campaign to raise $15 million to $20 million to complete Lux’s final space, the Exhibition Pavilion, which like Lux’s original Artist Pavilion was designed by Santa Monica-based architect Renzo Zecchetto.

“This (the Education Pavilion) is a modest project, really,” Shaw said. “And I hope this modest one gives us the fuel to be able to take on the major one (the Exhibition Pavilion).

“But we’re not borrowers; we raise the money before we build. If we don’t have it together in a year or so, whatever it takes, it takes. And as soon as we get it raised, we’ll go ahead with the Exhibition Pavilion.”